Official minutes of a BBC Trust meeting hurriedly convened the night George Entwistle resigned reveal barely a mention of the controversial decision to award him a payout £450,000, double the terms of his contract.

The BBC Trust organised a teleconference at 8.45pm on Saturday the 10 November, just ahead of the official announcement that Entwistle was to stand down as director general following Newsnight's inaccurate Lord McAlpine story. All but two of the 12 BBC trustees took part in the teleconference.

Four main points from the meeting have been minuted, compared to extensive minutes of the discussion published covering a teleconference meeting at 2.30pm the same day between the trustees and Entwistle – and they provide surprisingly scant details about the controversial pay out.

The minutes note only that the Lord Patten, the BBC Trust chairman, had "spoken to members of the trust's remuneration and appointments committee earlier in the day and agreed the terms of George Entwistle's departure from the BBC, as a consensual termination".

There are no minutes recorded of any comments made by the nine trustees on the 8.45pm conference call, aside from Patten, or the four members from the BBC Trust unit also on the call.

The terms of Entwistle's "consensual termination" have come in for heavy criticism, not least because the pay-out is double the terms of his contract and he only held the top BBC role for 54 days.

Patten defended the deal later in November when he told MPs on the Commons culture, media and sport select committee that during exit negotiations Entwistle had demanded an even bigger pay out.

Another BBC Trust meeting was also hurriedly convened on Sunday 11 November, the day after Entwistle resigned, to discuss the fall out and next steps.

Acting director general Tim Davie, in his first day in the job, outlined plans to deal with the Newsnight scandal "as a first step in restoring public confidence in BBC journalism".

Key steps included "re-establishing a single line of management to deal with all output, Savile related or otherwise, to address the lack of clarity around the editorial chain of command".

Dom Loehnis, the headhunter from Egon Zehnder who advised Patten on the hiring of Entwistle, attended the Sunday meeting to assist in the search for a replacement on a pro bono basis.

"Trust members discussed possible approaches to the recruitment and selection of a new director general," state the minutes of the meeting. "Members also discussed what attributes would be found in an ideal candidate … and to keep all options open."

The BBC executive board has come in for criticism for not having a firmer grip on the corporation's activities.

Minutes of a BBC Trust meeting held on 1 November reveal a discussion between Patten and BBC non-executive directors Marcus Agius and Dame Fiona Reynolds, where it was determined the board would need to act decisively over the Jimmy Savile scandal to rebuild its tarnished image.

"BBC Trust members agreed that it was important that Dame Fiona and her non-executive colleagues were well supported to enable them to undertake their role," state the BBC Trust minutes. "It would be important that the executive board's initial response to the Pollard inquiry was strong and comprehensive".

The internal inquiry into allegations of child sex abuse on BBC premises against Savile and Newsnight's abandoned 2011 investigation into the late Jim'll Fix It presenter is being headed by Nick Pollard, the former head of Sky News, who is expected to publish his findings next week.

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